


Have Some Fun Before We Die

by dovingbird



Category: Left 4 Dead 2
Genre: M/M, Masturbation, blowjob, handjob
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-25
Updated: 2014-01-25
Packaged: 2018-01-09 22:35:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1151614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dovingbird/pseuds/dovingbird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Nick heads off for the eight billionth time by himself, Rochelle and Coach are about ready to let him go. Ellis is a little more stubborn than that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Have Some Fun Before We Die

Gone.

Just like that. He's gone.  
  
“Good riddance,” Rochelle mutters as she leans down and grabs her gun. “I'm just about done with his shit.”  
  
But, see, Ellis knows she's gotta be joking or not serious or something, because Nick just walked out that door a few seconds ago. And all signs point toward the fact that he ain't coming back. And that means she might be done with his shit for real. Ellis tears toward the window suddenly and leans through the broken glass, staring off to where Nick is disappearing into the distance and plowing through the corpses they already shot dead. “Nick, what the hell, man?!” Ellis shouts after him, and it doesn't even take a full second before Rochelle has him jacked up against the wall. “Let me go!”  
  
“Ellis, sweetie,” she growls, right in his face, hands pinning his shoulders to the wall, “you know I love you, but I swear to God that if you summon a tank or a horde or something I'm throwing you right out that window.”  
  
He can't get mad because he's pretty sure she don't mean it, but at the same time she just let one-fourth of their team go off to certain death all on his lonesome, all over some stupid fucking argument, and that makes him think that maybe she has a lot more against all of them than he thought. “You don't understand, Ro, this is-”  
  
“She's right, son.” Coach grunts as he finishes taping up his knee again. He's moving a lot slower these days, Ellis notices, and it's only a matter of time before he stops being able to keep up unless something changes. He doesn't like to think about that either. “I don't like it either, but that don't mean we need you screaming your head off and calling every zombie from here to Atlanta.”  
  
“But it ain't fair! What if somethin' happens to him?!”  
  
“That's his choice.” Rochelle pushes away from him and goes back to her gun, where she can clean it more effectively. “And he made it. And he needs to lie in it like the dog he is.”  
  
Nothing makes sense anymore. He comes over and squats in front of her. “We gotta go after him, Ro, c'mon.”  
  
“Ellis...”  
  
“I know you don't like him sometimes, but listen, he's _cocky_. He's a cocky son of a bitch, and he's off on his own, and-”  
  
“Ellis, sweetie, can this-”  
  
“See, _this_ is why ya'll fucking _need_ me!” He slams his hands on the ground and comes to his feet, storming into the corner. “'Cuz you got your heads up your asses so far you can't see what! Don't act like you didn't want me to come along when we first ganged up at the mall. I know that's true. I know I just annoyed the shit outta all ya'll and you just wanted me to stay there or go off on my own or whatever, but if you didn't have _me,_ you'd all be so fucking stubborn that you'd all be dead! Jeesus!”  
  
“Youngin', I've had just about enough of this.” Coach glares at him from his chair, and even there, even when he's not coming after him or anything, he's still pretty damn scary, and Ellis feels himself shrink back a little. “For the record, I always wanted your ass around. I could already tell you were gonna keep everybody's heads up and spirits high, and you were damn good with a gun. And I wanted Rochelle around. And Nick too, for that matter. But he's gone. And he ain't comin' back. And you know he ain't.”  
  
“Only if we don't do anything about it. Only if we let him go.”  
  
“This isn't the first time, Ellis, you _know_ that,” Rochelle murmurs.  
  
“But what if it's the last?”  
  
She's quiet for a long few seconds before she sighs. “Look, we all knew this had to happen sooner or later. So maybe now's a good time. We don't...have to _know_ what happens to him. Maybe he makes it better on his own. Maybe he doesn't need all of us slowing him down.”  
  
“Yeah, or maybe he'll get smoked three blocks away.” Ellis stands up and scowls, wiping a trail of dirt off his forehead before checking the ammo in his gun. He's got a lot of killing to do. “I'm goin'. And I'm bringing him back.”  
  
“Ellis!” Coach barks. “That's some crazy shit you talkin' about!”  
  
“Naw, it's the _truth,_ and it's what both of ya'll shoulda done five minutes ago!” He ejects an empty shell from his shotgun, a nice sharp punctuation at the end of that sentence. “Ya'll go on if you want, stay if you want, hell, I don't give a shit, but I ain't lettin' him stay by himself. He don't have good peripherals.”  
  
Rochelle's got two thin lips pressed together and she ain't even looking at Ellis, but Coach, he's shoving himself to his feet, using his gun like a cane. “Naw, no way, you're not going off too. I'm going with you.”  
  
“Your leg's been bothering you for miles, old man,” Rochelle snaps out, glaring at Coach. “And I'm tired of seeing you limp. So sit down.” She sits back in her chair and props the newly-put-back-together sniper rifle on her boots. “Ellis can go if he wants, but you, you need time to sit, and you know it, and there's no way in hell I'm leaving you without a guard.”  
  
“But you'll let him go?” Coach waves toward Ellis.  
  
And then she looks at him, finally, and there's this real strange look in her eyes, something that makes him shiver a little but not in a bad way, and he don't really understand it. But she bites her bottom lip, so chapped that he's surprised it don't just burst open, and sighs. “Ellis can take care of himself. He's in good health. He'll find Nick. He'll bring him back. And we'll stay here and wait.” She rolls her hand around her belt, eyes never leaving his, before finding her first aid kit and chucking it at him. “Just in case.”  
  
He catches it and nods, strapping it to his back. “Now, look, if I ain't back in a day...ya'll get the hell outta here, all right?”  
  
“I'll see you in a few hours,” Rochelle says, almost interrupting his last word. “Go on, get going before a horde shows up.”  
  
He nods again, faster now, and makes sure the safety's off his shotgun just in case. “Yeah. See you then.”  
  
He descends the stairs two at a time, jumping down the last few to get his blood pumping in all the right ways, and heads out into the hot, sticky air, gun at the ready. And he don't acknowledge it, but when he glances over his shoulder just before he gets out of sight of the building, he sees Rochelle with that sniper rifle pointing in his direction, watching his back the whole way, and he's never felt safer.  
  
~~  
  
For a few minutes, everything's black. He can feel his body, can feel things that aren't supposed to go certain ways and stuff, but it's actually kind of weird because he's not hurting a whole hell of a lot, not yet. Maybe that's from the whole bottle of pills he chugged down the second he heard the snorting, all mad like a bull. No way around it when you don't even know where it is.  
  
Nick remembers seeing it. Remembers turning a corner and being eye-to-eye with it, somehow dodging under the Tank's swinging arm and shooting a full clip right between its eyes while he danced around just out of its reach. Remembers how it finally got a nice, solid hit on him that had him flying straight into a wall and skidding down it. Remembers being on the ground and firing the only gun he could reach – his pistol – and thinking that if he was gonna die here, he was gonna die with that Tank bleeding out right above him.  
  
And then the full-out berserker screaming around the corner, and a shotgun going like nothing else, and this big stupid ass running in like he was Superman or something, like a Tank couldn't take him down like it could anyone else. And then...everything had faded out.  
  
His head is still swimming, but he thinks he's hallucinated, because it's almost like a strong pair of hands is wrapping bandages around his arm. He tries to calculate the amount of money he's going to have to spend to get this damn suit cleaned once everything gets back in order. Doesn't work. He's too busy trying to figure out why opening his eyes means there's stars flickering over his head when they're inside and it's nighttime.  
  
"C'mon, Nick, just hang in there..."  
  
A drawl that he's way too familiar with after these weeks of traveling and murdering. He closes his eyes to block out the distracting stars and tries to focus. Inhales. Smells the saltiness of sweat in the air, of musk, of exertion, all mixed with the visceralness of the gun smoke. He thinks there might be blood under that too, but he's gotten used to that now, hasn't he? After he did that thing where he dug a hand through a dead Survivor's intestines to get to the pill bottle that was somehow intact under them, he sort of became immune to that smell.  
  
"Now, I'm gonna carry your ass if I gotta, but I don't really think you'd appreciate that, and I really don't want you to shoot me when you wake up and see what I'm doin', so..."  
  
He reaches up weakly and wraps a hand around a thick wrist, shakily exhaling. "Ellis...?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Shut up."  
  
He pauses. "Okay." And even with just that one word, Nick can hear the stupid grin on his face.  
  
Now that he has a little better grasp on the presence that _isn't_ a hallucination, knows who's above him, who's making sure he'll last the night for some ungodly reason, the smell of Ellis mixing up in his head is just making him foggy again. He groans softly. Hopes that Ellis will think it's just from the pain of his fingers pressing into that gaping wound on his shoulder - thanks for that, Jockey, thanks much. Because in this strange, undulating place, he knows better.  
  
He's starting to understand it a hell of a lot more now that he doesn't have a constant chatter around him.  
  
Who knew that Hee Haw here was even able to keep his mouth shut for more than five minutes? The damn boy's woken up a witch from thirty feet away just from that drawl of his. Fun day, that. But the silence is also disconcerting. He doesn't like it as much as he thought he would. After being used to the sound of chatter, of breathing, of grunting and fighting and firing, absolute silence scares him into thinking he might be deaf. Or dead. Either way.  
  
He squeezes Ellis's wrist a little tighter and opens his eyes, lids fluttering. Ellis's tongue is poking out from between his lips in concentration. There's a slick of blood across his cap, standing out vibrantly against the softer colors, and Nick's pretty sure he can see a piece of brain there too. Dirt's smeared down his cheek, and the neckline of his shirt's gotten torn a little, probably from that Hunter and how it almost got a hold on him right before everything went to shit and Nick decided he didn't wanna deal with it anymore. The kid's bruised and beaten up and he stinks to high heaven.  
  
Nick's pulse is still beating faster than it should be.  
  
Ellis yanks his bottle of pills from his belt and pops it open. "Open up," he murmurs, and he's actually trying to be quiet for once, which is funny, but though Nick wants to tease him about it it's sort of hard to do that when filthy fingers are sliding several little white capsules past your teeth. His index finger brushes against Nick's tongue just to be sure the pills are in place, and he tastes blood, hopes for the millionth time that this plague can't be passed on by consumption even though he's swallowed flying blood more times than he can count thanks to this apocalypse. Ellis's hand shakes a little as he pulls it back, and Nick snaps his gaze up to the boy's eyes. The kid might look back down at the pill bottle to cap it, but that doesn't change the fact that Nick thinks he saw him staring right smack dab at his mouth too.  
  
Once he's dry-swallowed the pills Nick quirks an eyebrow. "You took on a Tank for me," he says, his voice rough and gravely from the Jockey's hands wrapping around his throat.  
  
Ellis shrugs. "Yeah, well-"  
  
"That's the stupidest shit I've ever seen you do."  
  
"Hey!"  
  
"You see a Tank, you're by yourself, you fucking _run,_ do you hear me? You don't just take it on. You're not a fucking superhero."  
  
"Well, what the hell was you doin', then?!" Ellis's voice cracks in his exasperation. "Playing some fucking hopscotch with it?!"  
  
"I was _trying_ to run. And then it hit me through a wall. You missed that part before you came barreling in."  
  
"I saved your _life._ "  
  
"You should've let me die."  
  
Ellis scoffs. He starts winding another bandage around Nick's thigh, but Nick's not at all surprised that he's tightening it like a boa constrictor. "Can't believe you ain't grateful."  
  
"Grateful? For what? Making me go through another few weeks of this hell? Jesus Christ, Ellis, you've gotta know by now we're not gonna make it. Might as well just let it happen." He sucks in a sharp breath when Ellis pulls that bandage just a little tighter, the son of a bitch. "Besides, you and I both know the whole reason you came around that corner was to find me and improve your chances of surviving, so excuse me for not thanking you for saving your own ass."  
  
"What the hell does that mean?"  
  
"We survived _this_ long in a team, didn't we? Just you and Rochelle and Coach, maybe that's not good enough odds for you." A thought occurs to him, like a bullet through his brain, and Nick looks up at Ellis again. "Where the hell are they anyway?" He swallows. "They get knocked off already?"  
  
"Man, you know how Coach's been. Limping like a baby cow near a twister? Ro wasn't gonna let him go anywhere 'til it cooled off. She said she was gonna keep an eye on him, make sure he didn't get himself done in."  
  
Nick is silent for a moment. "...and you-"  
  
"I came looking for you."  
  
More pulse pounding. He doesn't really wanna think about what that means. "By yourself?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
But his tongue is still loose, just like his thoughts, and so he's not surprised when he blurts "Why?"  
  
Ellis blinks, forehead wrinkling. "...'cuz I had to." He shakes his head, like Nick's a kid and doesn't really understand a damn thing about the world. The irony. "You were gonna die out there, Nick. And I ain't gonna let that happen on my watch."  
  
And that, more than anything, doesn't make sense in Nick's head, because the idea of someone caring so much about him that they don't want him to die is even stupider than jumping on a Tank's shoulders and trying to choke it with a Kleenex.  
  
Ellis ties off the bandage and reaches up, very gingerly touching what must be a cut on Nick's forehead. "Man, you got yourself all kinds of banged up, didn't you?" he asks softly, voice low in his throat.  
  
"Sorry I didn't fight up to your standards," Nick mutters, though his last couple of words get a little shaky when Ellis's fingers tickle a few loose pieces of Nick's hair.  
  
“Yeah, well...guess we gotta get you a chainsaw or somethin'. You'd be real damn good with one of those.”  
  
“How about not.” Nick flicks his eyes all over Ellis's face, trying to absorb him, to figure out what the face of a man who cares actually looks like. “Think that might be more your style.”  
  
Ellis grins. “Nothin' better. Man, Keith woulda shit himself for the chance to wail on a couple of zombies with one of those.”  
  
He doesn't really wanna hear about that kid right now. “Guess we'd better head back, huh?”  
  
“What? You serious? You just lost like a couple of gallons of blood or somethin'! I think somethin' in one of your legs is maybe broken too? Ain't no way we're movin' yet.”  
  
Nick frowns. “What, you think we've got a choice? Come on, kid. I've been worse off.” Except now he's seeing all new colors, but that's probably from all those pills and whatever else. “Listen. If we don't go now, then we're sitting ducks when a new horde shows up. Do you want that? Some pigeon or whatever to land on a car out there and set the alarm off?”  
  
Ellis is scowling right back at him as he takes the last little sliver of bandages and dabs at Nick's forehead. “I can watch the damn door while you take a nap or somethin'. Jesus Christ.”  
  
“I'm not even tired!” And it's true, he's not, though that's probably just from all the adrenaline still going through him and the fact that under it all is a low, thrumming buzz.  
  
“Tough shit.”  
  
He doesn't like Ellis sometimes. But fighting him is exhausting, and he never wins because the kid doesn't use an ounce of logic anyway, so fine, Nick decides, he'll just stay right here with his head in the kid's lap, and fuck everything else.  
  
That doesn't sound like a bad idea, actually.  
  
Nick realizes his thumb is absently rubbing against Ellis's wrist a few seconds later, but Ellis isn't complaining. He's just sitting. Dabbing. Concentrating. Does he even know he's being touched? Are the survivors so worn into each other now that they just sort of overlap? It's fucking weird, it is. Nick can still remember how they all met up, how all he wanted to do was just keep them around as meat shields so he could get to safety. But now he knows them. He knows Coach's wife's name. He knows Rochelle's three favorite foods. He knows Ellis's smell.  
  
Hell, now he even knows a little about the taste of his skin.  
  
He's riding high from the pills. He's feeling surprisingly safe, because if it's still this quiet then it means Ellis blew away every zombie from here to kingdom come in his stupid quest to find Nick. And then there's the fact that his head's resting on the thigh of the kid who just decided that it was even a good idea to do that, that thinks he's worth the time and energy and possible death.  
  
So he decides to take the leap, because in his fuzzy head, there's nothing else to do to pass the time. Why the hell not?  
  
“So kid.”  
  
“I ain't a kid.”  
  
“Whatever.” Nick waves it off. “How long are you gonna keep us here? An hour? Or two?”  
  
He shrugs. “Yeah, I guess. I mean, I gotta relax for a second too, don't I? And I guess I gotta clean my gun 'fore too much shit gets all clogged up in it again, so may as well do that too. And there might be some food in that kitchen downstairs, you think about that? Hell, ain't no reason to go anywhere fast, 's far as I'm concerned.”  
  
Perfect. Nick slowly sits up, wincing a little as his head readjusts to the new altitude, before looking over his shoulder at Ellis. “So we might as well do something while we're waiting, right?”  
  
Ellis blinks. “What, like play a game?”  
  
“Something like that.” He forces his brain to slow down, to divert back to regularly scheduled programming for a moment. “First things first, you wanna go check that door? Make sure it's locked?”  
  
“Sure.” Ellis hops to his feet and saunters over to the door and gives it a check. “...uh, Nick?”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
He jiggles it, making it open. “The thing don't even shut all the way.”  
  
Shit. That's gonna put a damper on the situation. But he's already got his mind made up and he's notoriously stubborn, so there's no way he's going back on this. “All right, just...just close it as much as you can, all right?”  
  
“Cool.” Ellis does so. He nods very thoughtfully before moseying his way back toward Nick. “So what we gonna play? Twenty Questions? I was always pretty good at that one. 'Cept with Keith, 'cuz he always knew I was guessin' The Midnight Riders, for some reason...”  
  
Nick doesn't have time for this. The second Ellis is within reach he shoves the kid against the wall and holds him there, hands on his hips as he looks up at him from his kneeling position, ignoring the kid's exclamation of surprise. “Ellis. Shut. Up.”  
  
“Man, what the hell're you doin'?!”  
  
“Well, you saved my life, didn't you?” Nick quirks a brow as he loops his fingers down through the waistband of Ellis's overalls, thumbs toying with the dangling straps. “You think I wasn't gonna repay you?”  
  
Ellis blinks rapidly, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. “You...you gonna give me a bottle of pills when you find it?”  
  
Nick chuckles. “No. I'm not _that_ grateful.” He yanks at the overalls, just enough to tug Ellis's hips toward him. “Tell me something, kid, all that time you spent with Keith...did you ever find yourself getting curious?”  
  
“Curious?”  
  
“About stuff?”  
  
“Wh-what sorta stuff you talkin' about?” He's starting to sweat again. Nick can see it beading over his skin, plain as day, like he's got a fever.  
  
He probably shouldn't feel as proud of himself as he does.  
  
“The two of you out one night, drinking beer in the back of his truck, looking up at the stars and talking about tits and pussy and getting all hot and bothered...you ever think about how easy it might be for him to just roll over...and suck your cock?”  
  
“Whoa, I...” Ellis's hands reach down, touch Nick's own, but they don't push him away. They just brush against his arms, shaking a little, resting against his skin. “...I-I mean...”  
  
“You ever get to wrestling when you watched WWE and get him on top of you and feel your hips against each other and just start grinding like the horny kids you were?”  
  
He's never seen someone turn that color red before. He doesn't even have something to say to that. Just shivers, eyes nice and wide and confused.  
  
“You ever had a mouth on your dick before, kid? Any mouth?”  
  
Ellis shakes his head. “N-no.”  
  
“Then today's your lucky day.”  
  
Ellis makes a little choking noise when Nick starts working his overalls down, because he knows that if he gives the kid a chance to think he'll find a way to remember that he's not into this. “I-I didn't know you was queer,” he stammers, hands pressed back against the wall like he's feeling around for an escape.  
  
Nick chuckles and shakes his head. “I'm not.”  
  
“What? Then you, uh...w-what are you?”  
  
“Someone not as concerned about the concept of human duality,” he snarks. The overalls drop to Ellis's ankles. He's filthy. But then again, they all are. And Nick's always had a little taste for sweat – anything salty, really. He licks his lips as he rests his hands on Ellis's strong thighs and glances up at him. “You've gotta do something for me, kid.”  
  
Ellis looks like he's on the verge of a panic attack, but he still hasn't said no, and he still hasn't tried to run away, and he hasn't even done a damn thing to try to stop him. “Whazzat?”  
  
“I need you to take that Magnum of yours off your back.”  
  
Ellis complies, his breathing thickening.  
  
“And I need you to point it at the door.”  
  
He does, finger instinctively flicking the safety off.  
  
“And if anything comes peeling through that door...I want you to shoot it dead.”  
  
Ellis makes a little nervous keening noise, and Nick slowly smirks.  
  
“You hear me?”  
  
“Uh-huh.” Ellis nods.  
  
“And don't you even fucking think about making a sound louder than how we're talking. Because if you summon a horde just because you've never been sucked off before, I'm not even gonna save your ass.”  
  
Ellis licks his lips, eyes flicking back down to Nick's. “It's not like I-I'm no virgin or nothin', y'know. Like, there was that one time with Keith's sister-”  
  
Nick presses his hand flush against Ellis's cock through his gray briefs – gray originally or from dirt? He doesn't know – and is beyond satisfied by the sound of his words choking to a stop. “You say one more word about that son of a bitch, and I'll bite your dick off, do you hear me?”  
  
There's a little bucking under his hand, Ellis groaning softly, and Nick can't help but chuckle. Finally he's figured out how to shut the kid up. Thank God for that. He lowers his eyes back to the hips right in front of him, watching the way that Ellis is starting to tent his briefs under Nick's hand, and decides he's done enough waiting.  
  
He meant what he said. He doesn't have the time or the patience for concepts like heterosexuality and homosexuality. He's not even bisexual. It's not every guy that gets him high, just like it's not every girl. He's gotta know them. He's gotta be at least vaguely tolerant of what they have to say. He's gotta be willing to loan them five bucks for some gas or something. And he knows he'd do all that for Ellis. He might talk a big game, try to hold him at bay, but when push comes to shove Ellis is the first person Nick's willing to go back-to-back with when those zombies come tearing around the corner. He's a good kid. He really is. He's brave and he cares and he'll chuck adrenaline shots at everybody for years before taking one himself, and if a Tank comes around the corner and someone doesn't see it, he'll go wailing right at it with a damn fire ax.  
  
He's good. That's what it is. He's honestly and truly good, right down to the core. And Nick thinks that maybe he'd like a little taste of that for himself.  
  
He peels Ellis's briefs away from his hips, from that pelvic bone that could take his eye out if he gets too close, it's so sharp, and admires the sight in front of him. Kid's got a good cock. He traces his fingers over it, tilting his head to the side a little, just getting the feel of it, just watching the way his foreskin pulls back when Nick tightens his fingers in a circle and pulls. It's real damn nice. “Not bad,” he murmurs.  
  
Ellis is catching his breath, but Nick can tell he's trying to be quiet, just like he commanded.  
  
He's also watching him. Nick frowns up at him. “Eyes on the door, Overalls.” Ellis follows his command, but Nick still rolls his eyes. “I'll be damned if we get grabbed by twin Hunters just because you're so obsessed with watching. No, you keep an eye out. And just _feel._ ”  
  
He starts up a slow rhythm, because though he knows they don't have a lot of time he also knows there's not going to be another opportunity for this down the road. One of them will probably end up getting smoked or whatever – preferably Nick, since he doesn't wanna think about how quiet it'll get if Ellis gets run down before he does – or, even if they _do_ get to safety, they'll go their separate ways and never see each other again. This is his one chance. One shot.  
  
And it's a damn shame, because if the kid's got nice legs like this, it means he's got an even tighter ass, and that's something Nick wouldn't mind fucking once or twice.  
  
“You like that?” he asks softly when Ellis moves his hips a little – not a buck, not quite, but enough to make Nick pick up the rhythm a little.  
  
Ellis's response is a quiet moan. His hand is shaking on the Magnum. Nick grins like he just found the easiest slot machine to crack.  
  
He leans in and presses his lips against the head of the kid's cock, just a kiss, just enough to feel the heat of it on his mouth, and this time? Ellis bucks. He bucks so hard it's all Nick can do not to chomp his teeth down at the sudden intrusion into his mouth. His nerves are better after all these surprises, all this death, all those Hunters jumping around the corner at the worst times, but he's still not infallible. He presses a hand against Ellis's abdomen and slams his ass back against the wall, glaring up at him. “All right, Overalls, it's time for you to learn a little etiquette.” He squeezes the kid's cock, tight enough that he knows it's gotta be borderline on pain from the sound Ellis makes. He knows what he sounds like when he's hurt, after all. “When you've got an incredibly skilled man about to swallow every inch of you down, you don't take the lead and try and choke him. Especially if you don't know what the hell you're doing.”  
  
“Hell, I-I'm sorry, Nick, I just-”  
  
“I don't have time for your excuses. Now sit back and let me do the work.”  
  
Before Ellis can find something to say about that, can complain, Nick dives forward and wraps his mouth around his cock, stretching his lips around him easily. He cradles the bottom of his shaft with his tongue, feeling every little ridge, every bumpy vein, even as he bobs his head up and down the length of him. Ellis is groaning, whispering a constant stream of “Holy Christ-loving fucking _shit_ ” and other such profanities, but he isn't bucking. He's just swaying a little, trying to stay on his feet.  
  
Nick understands that. He knows he's nice and talented.  
  
He keeps his hand pumping at the base, up and down, a nice and steady and smooth pace, accentuating the way he's fucking the kid with his mouth rather than detracting from it, and Jesus, this is good, it's _way_ too good. Maybe it's the fact that it might be the last time he ever sucks dick or maybe it's because it's been ages since he last did or maybe it's just because Ellis tastes _so_ fucking good under the sweat and the dirt and the grime, but Nick closes his eyes and drowns in the whole of it for a moment.  
  
He wants this to last. He really does. But he's a selfish bastard, and he also wants to taste Ellis's come and know if it's just as addicting as his skin.  
  
Nick breaks away from his cock with an audible pop and cranes his neck, planting open-mouthed and suckling kisses all down his shaft. Ellis is panting. He's still cursing. But he's still got his eyes on the door, and so Nick keeps indulging himself. He switches with his hand, lets his thumb brush against the head of Ellis's dick ever so gently as his lips continue their long journey. He realizes _he's_ groaning too just from the fire that's burning through him, that's got him straining against his own pants, and there's no way in hell he's going to have any time to do anything with it after this is over, so he crams his other hand right down past his waistband and seizes his own hardness, starts working at it like he's only got a limited number of seconds left to live. And when he sucks gently at one of Ellis's balls, just the barest bit of contact, and listens to the kid's head snap back against the wall as he yowls out a “Fuck _me!_ ” he wishes he'd started a little earlier.  
  
“You getting close?” Nick growls just before he lathes his tongue all the way up his shaft, as smooth as a jazz player caressing a string of piano keys. “You ready to come?”  
  
“Holy _shit,_ Nick!” And even though Ellis still has that gun on the door he reaches blindly with his other hand and rakes it straight through Nick's hair, messing it up all the worse, making it throb just a little, just like his dick, and Nick works his hand furiously in his pants as he wraps his lips around Ellis's cock again. And it's only seconds before Ellis lets go and starts spurting jets right down Nick's throat.  
  
He swallows every drop of it down like a shot of the finest whiskey, but even the jolt of that isn't enough to start his own release. As he moves his hand to press against Ellis's abdomen again, keeping him on his feet, keeping him steady, he gulps and catches his breath. He leans forward and touches his forehead to Ellis's hard stomach. Tries to figure out if he should keep pumping his own cock or not. He's probably already got Ellis borderline suicidal from thinking he might be gay, the little Southern boy. He's not sure he wants to ruin the kid's sanity any more with the realization of what Nick was up to that entire time.  
  
“Don't stop.”  
  
Nick glances up at Ellis, his temple on his stomach. “...sorry, kid, you're not ready for round two. You're as flaccid as a-”  
  
“I mean...you. You don't stop.” He looks down from the door and his eyes fall right on Nick's hand in his pants, at the shape of his knuckles pressing through the fabric. “I-I wanna...I wanna see.”  
  
Nick raises his eyebrows. The thought is so absurd that he actually chuckles breathlessly. “You turning into a fag on me, Ellis?”  
  
He meets Nick's eyes. Gives a little shrug of his own. “Guess I never much cared for all that doo-ality shit neither,” he murmurs.  
  
Nick stares up at him. And then he pushes away from Ellis, laying back on the floor, thankful that this room, at least, isn't covered completely in blood and guts, that he can find a clean spot on the laminate. “You really wanna see?”  
  
Ellis nods. “Yeah.”  
  
Well then, how can he say no to that? “Keep that gun up,” Nick murmurs. He unbuckles his belt and works down his zipper. “If you're gonna watch, you'd better swear to me that you're keeping your ears on the door.”  
  
Ellis nods again, a little faster this time. “You got it.”  
  
Nick gives a shivering sigh of relief when he pops free of his boxer briefs, leaning his head back to close his eyes at the delicious taste of freedom. No more painful pressure. It doesn't really matter that the thick and humid air doesn't feel all that great on his naked skin after he's so used to this damn suit, not really, because he knows he isn't gonna last long anyway. Not after a show like that. He closes his eyes as he wraps his hand around himself again, remembering Ellis's groans, his hooded eyelids, his shaking hand, everything. “Jesus, Ellis...” He sucks in a sharp breath through his teeth just at the thought alone of the kid watching him, getting an eyeful of exactly what he'd done to Nick without even trying. At the thought of what would happen if they didn't have to worry about zombies coming in that door at any time.  
  
He wonders if Ellis really _was_ interested in guys, or if this was just a one-time-thing. If he'd ever showered with that friend of his in the gym at his high school and checked him out the whole time. And that makes Nick think of their first taste of freedom, at how all four of them would be so desperate for a shower and how there'd only be one open and how he could touch his lips to Ellis's ear and whisper that they could share. How fascinating Ellis's naked body would feel under his soapy hands, all hard angles and sharpness and chiseled perfection after countless straight weeks of running and jumping and climbing and pounding zombies in the face. How he'd be so desperate and horny and grateful to be alive that he'd abandon the tough guy act and just lube up Ellis's cock and his own asshole with palmfuls of greasy hair conditioner and taunt the kid until he slid inside of him and fucked his brains out.  
  
It's too much. Just imagining Ellis inside of him makes colors explode behind Nick's eyelids, those colors he'd never seen before today, and he has to chomp down so hard on his lips to hold in his screams as he comes that he tastes a gushing flow of his own blood.  
  
He floats there. He lets himself have that one privilege, that one moment to hover over the world and forget all the corpses and all the death and all the blood and gore and brains and just _bask._  
  
It's Ellis's voice that brings him out of it. “Holy shit.”  
  
Nick chuckles, cracking open one eye to admire the mess he's made on his hand and his abdomen. “Goddamn.”  
  
He glances up to see Ellis's face, his wide eyes, his mouth open in shock, and he laughs a little more. He's so innocent, this kid, isn't he? He's probably read a million Playboys and watched a month's worth of hours of porn, but he still looks like he just found out that Jimmy Gibbs, Jr., was alive again, and coming to his birthday party. It's hilarious. And he decides, hey, he might as well fuck with the kid a little more, right? He takes a drop or two of his own load on his fingers and keeps his eyes right on Ellis's as he lifts it to his mouth and sucks his fingers clean.  
  
Ellis looks like he's about to break, like sanity might finally be a thing of the past. But then something changes on his face, and Nick'll be damned if he doesn't just drop to his knees and let his Magnum go skidding across the floor and lean down to run his tongue over Nick's skin. “Oh, god _damn,_ Ellis!”  
  
Ellis groans against Nick, sucking every drop of the come off of his body, wrinkling his forehead as he does so. “Damn, that tastes weird.”  
  
“You complaining?” Nick manages to ask through the post-orgasmic haze.  
  
“Naw, just sayin' I expected it to taste different.” He shrugs, licking his lips to get at the last few drops. “Guess it ain't bad, though.”  
  
Nick chuckles again. “Well, yours isn't exactly cotton candy either, Heehaw.”  
  
“I know, right?” Ellis grins as he rolls onto his side and looks up at Nick, his arm resting across the older man's thighs.  
  
Nick pauses. “Wait...have you tasted your own come?”  
  
Ellis purses his lips and nods. “Yeah, I guess I'd say...about two or three times.”  
  
“Then why the hell'd you expect it to taste any different?” Nick asks with another laugh, shaking his head.  
  
“Aw, hell, I dunno, just sort of figured something might be different. Like maybe all that shit you drink's going straight through your liver and into your balls or something.”  
  
Nick drops his head back onto the ground with a snort. “Ellis, you're a goddamn idiot.” But his clean hand found its way into the tendrils of hair at the base of his neck anyway, the ones free from his ball cap.  
  
It takes Nick a few moments of peace to realize that it isn't completely quiet anymore.  
  
He lifts his head and stares at the door, trying to figure out exactly what he's hearing. He waits. And then the door explods as a giant figure comes rushing in and spewing green fluid. “Oh, shit!” He and Ellis roll to each side, but only Nick is prepared enough to yank his shotgun off of his back and blow the Spitter's head off.  
  
They stare for a few heartpounding seconds at the fluid seeping into the floor before Nick glares up at Ellis. “I am never fucking blowing you again.”  
  
“What?! What the hell!”  
  
“You took your eye off the door, dipshit!” He ejects the shell and tucks himself back into his pants with a roll of his eyes. “Jesus Christ, I should've known better.”  
  
“Well, you wasn't watching it either!” Ellis pouts like a puppy as he puts himself back together and retrieves his Magnum. “It ain't my fault.”  
  
“Says you.” Nick slings an arm around Ellis's neck and noogies him, sending his cap askew. “All right, jackass, let's get the hell out of here before Rochelle and Coach decide we're not coming back and go on without us.”  
  
“You're an asshole.”  
  
“You wouldn't have me any other way.”


End file.
